Brookston Beer Bulletin

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Beer In Ads #417: Under Peter Ballantine’s Glass

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Tuesday’s ad is an old woodcut piece of art used to promote Ballantine Ale. Whether it was used in an advertisement or for some other promotional purpose is unclear. It’s visually telling the presumably mythical story of how the Ballantine three-ring logo was born, when its founder, Peter Ballantine, had set down his glass a few times, accidentally creating a perfect geometric shape known as Borromean rings. As the first woodcut suggests “Under his glass Peter Ballantine found a trade-mark now famous.” The Borromean rings became Ballantine’s logo, which did make the brand very recognizable.

ballantine-woodcut-1

In the second woodcut, the incredibly buff Peter Ballantine is pointing to the rings, presumably showing them to someone else, unless he’s in the habit of pointing and talking to himself, of course. And just look at the grip he keeps on his beer. No one is taking that glass away from him.

ballantine-woodcut-2

Still, pretty awesome art.

Beer In Ads #416: Pabst Makes It Perfect!

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Monday’s ad is for Pabst from, it appears, sometime in the 1950s. It’s a double truck ad with a free wheeling high-spirited woman on one side of the fence and her conservative beau on the other. In his cowboy hat and tweed jacket, he’s looking askance at her unfettered emotions, barely moving as he holds on to his bottle of beer.

Pabst-makes-perfect

Guinness Ad #77: Free Kick

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Our 77th Guinness ad features a free kick in a soccer … er, football match that the goalie is unable to stop because it was kicked hard enough to propel both the ball and the goalie into the net for a score. The source of that force can be found sticking out of his back pocket: a bottle of Guinness.

Guinness-free-kick

Beer In Ads #414: Burgie! Original California Beer

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Thursday’s ad is for Burgie, from 1974, and makes a big deal about its California origins. “The California life. You can live it anywhere, because most of all it’s a feeling. Burgie beer was made for that special feeling. Light. Golden. With the true Western taste. If you live our life, you’re going to love our beer.” The can shows an old-time San Francisco scene and that’s where the can says it was brewed, too. So he kicker is that after lavishing all that attention on California, the tagline veers eastward. “Burgie: Original California Beer. Now in Chicago.”

Burgie-1974-cal

Beer In Ads #411: Time Out For Schlitz

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Monday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1952. It shows a domestic scene where a couple is trying to decide what color to paint a room. But the husband seems far more interested in the color of his beer than any of the swatches on the wall. He’s taking “Time out for Schlitz.” And how about those red socks he’s wearing? I’m not sure he’s the best person to ask for color advice anyway.

Schlitz-1952-painters

Beer In Art #135: Michael Pacher’s Mary Of Burgundy

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This week’s work of art is by an Austrian artist, Michael Pacher, who painted this portrait of Mary of Burgundy in 1490.

Mary_of_burgundy-1490-Michael_pacher

Mary of Burgundy “ruled the Burgundian territories in Low Countries and was suo jure Duchess of Burgundy from 1477-1482. As the only child of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, and his wife Isabella of Bourbon, she was the heiress to the vast Burgundian domains in France and the Low Countries upon her father’s death. Her mother died in 1465, but Mary was on very good terms with her stepmother Margaret of York, whom Charles married in 1468.”

But today, for the beer lover at least, what Mary’s most famous for is that the Flanders red ale, Duchesse de Bourgogne, from the Brouwerij Verhaeghe, is named for her though the label is a different painting of Mary.

Their importer, Specialty Beer, describes the beer like this:

DUCHESSE DE BOURGOGNE from Brouwerij Verhaeghe is the traditional Flemish red ale. This refreshing ale is matured in oak casks; smooth with a rich texture and interplay of passion fruit, and chocolate, and a long, dry and acidic finish. After the first and secondary fermentation, the beer goes for maturation into the oak barrels for 18 months. The final product is a blend of younger 8 months old beer with 18 months old beer. The average age of the Duchesse de Bourgogne before being bottled is 12 months.

duchesse-glass

You can read Pacher’s biography at Wikipedia and there are more links about him at ArtCyclopedia. You can also see more of Pacher’s paintings at Artilim, Jitiky and the Web Gallery of Art.